Nuts is a card game which my family has played ever since someone learned it while they were drunk. Apparently, the actual name for it is “Nerts”, and it’s also known as Pounce. It’s similar to solitaire although it involves 2 players. It’s very similar to MSN’s Solitaire Showdown, so you should have no problem following the rules, if you’ve already played either.
Players: 2+
Deck: 1 for each player, no jokers, different backs
Objective: To play all cards from your Nut/Pounce pile during each hand and to accumulate the most points overall
Play: Each player starts with one deck which he shuffles and then deals out 11 cards, face up in a pile. He then passes the 11 cards, which become the nut pile, and the remaining cards to the player on his left who will do the same so each player no longer has the deck he started with.
Players will each dominate a space of table, as in solitaire and will place the Nut pile on the right side of the space ( or left if the player prefers.) Next to this pile, players will lay one card face up, then 4 cards face down. On the first face down card closest to the Nut pile, the player will lay a card face up and lay 1 card each on the remaining face down cards. Players will continue by laying 1 card face up, 2 down then 1 up, 1 down, then 1 up until there are 5 work piles with the top card face up, similar to solitaire.
2 players will generally play across from eachother while more players will play around the table. In between, on the center of the table, will be be space for foundation piles. There will be a foundation pile for each Ace in the game (4 Aces per deck). The foundation piles do not have to be neat, and often are not with more players.
There are no turns. Players are constantly moving cards, checking foundation piles and working through their deck at the same time.
Play begins and players will simultaneously check to see if any of the work pile cards or the top card on the Nut pile is an Ace which can be moved to the center to begin a foundation pile. Players will also check to see if any of their cards can be moved to work piles; a card from the Nut pile or any of the 5 top work pile cards facing up can be moved to the another work pile to create columns that count down, in alternate suits.
Any time a work pile card is moved and a face down card is revealed, a player can flip up the card and play it, if possible. Any time all the cards form a work pile, and there are less than 5 work piles, a player places the top card of his Nut pile in that spot.
If no cards can be played, the player will take the remainder of the cards from the deck, his hand, and begin to play it by flipping up the top 3 cards. If the top card can be played, the player can do so and then will be able to play the second card. If the top card is not playable, the player cannot play any cards beneath it. Cards from this pile can be played to the foundation piles or on the 5 work piles of cards in front of a player.
After a player turns up all his cards, he retrieves the discard pile and will begin again, turning up the top 3 cards and playing if possible. As cards are played from the pile, new playing possibilities turn up.
During the game, a player will constantly check the foundation piles to see if he has in his hand, on top of the columns or on top of the Nut pile which can be played to the foundation piles. Foundation piles start with an Ace and count up to King, containing all cards of the same suit. After a King is laid on a foundation pile, the pile can removed from game play.
If 2 or more players try to play a card to a foundation pile, the player who reached it the quickest is allowed to keep his card on the pile and the other player(s) must return the card to his deck, Nut pile or work pile.
Each round ends when one player uses the lasts card from his Nut pile and shouts “Nuts” to signal the end of the game. The other players will count the cards left in their Nut piles.
The winner of the round will collects all the cards and foundation piles from the center of the table, and sort them out between the players who laid them by the backs of the cards. Nuts cannot be played with 2 or more decks of the same card-back pattern because of this.
Each player will count the cards returned to him.
The player who won will have a score equal to how many cards he played. The other players subtract twice the amount of cards from their Nut pile (if the nut pile has 6 cards, the players subtract 12) from the cards they get back and this becomes their score.
Play continues until an agreed upon amount.
Variations:
- Deck trade direction
- Every time the highest score reaches 50 or a multiple of 50, direction changes when players pass cards to another player at the beginning of a hand.
- Score
- When players keep score, they only subtract the amount of cards remaining in their Nut pile from the cards they played and got back.
- Face Down Nuts Pile
- all cards but the top card of the Nuts pile are dealt face down
- Burying
- If all players become stuck and cannot play another card, they can move the top card of their stock pile tot he bottom and begin playing again by flipping over the top 3 cards.
- Playing on Nut Pile
- Although most versions do not allow playing cards onto the Nut pile, some do.
- Nut pile not played on work piles
- Cards from the not pile cannot be played on work piles, only empty spaces.
- Alternative to Burying
- At a point when all players are stuck, each player will remove the bottom-most card from the (5th) work pile on the right, only if is it face down, and play it, if possible. If not, it becomes added to the bottom of the player’s hand.
- Do not Exchange Cards
- Each player deals out his own cards and keeps the same deck through out the game.